The present invention relates to a vehicle collision damage repair process and system. The present invention more particularly relates to a vehicle collision repair system and process utilizing the system. The vehicle collision repair system includes means, such as a rail system to advance vehicle through the vehicle collision repair process.
The exterior bodies of vehicles are primarily manufactured from steel, other metal alloys, and composite materials. The materials from which the exterior bodies of vehicles are manufactured for the most part are not plastic materials. Thus, when a force is applied to the exterior body of a vehicle during a collision, the portion of the exterior body subjected to the force does not return to its original shape. To the contrary, exterior bodies of vehicles are usually permanently deflected in response to a force applied during the impact of a collision.
Depending on the extent of damage sustained by the vehicle during a collision, the vehicle may be a candidate for collision damage repair. There are about forty thousand vehicle collision repair facilities in the United States. It is estimated that in the United States, vehicle owners and insurance companies expend about twenty-six billion dollars on an annual basis for vehicle collision repair services.
The vast majority of vehicle collision damage repair service providers follow the traditional sub-contractor method of providing vehicle collision damage repair services. That is, once a damaged vehicle is received into the repair facility, it is assigned to a single technician. Traditionally, this technician will handle the entire vehicle repair process from beginning to end. This often results in an increase in the time it takes to complete a collision repair job and leads to inconsistencies in the quality of the collision repair job.
Also according to the sub-contractor method, the vehicle collision repair facility does not supply the required tools to technicians to enable the technicians to complete the vehicle collision repair. To the contrary, according to the sub-contractor approach, individual technicians are required to provide their own tools. This results in a significant initial monetary investment by the individual technician. The sub-contractor approach to providing vehicle collision repair services, therefore, results in difficulties in recruiting, hiring and retaining repair technicians.
Thus, there is a need in the vehicle collision repair industry for a vehicle collision repair system and process of collision repair that increases the consistency of the repair process, increases the quality of the repaired vehicle, increases the rate of delivery of the repaired vehicle to the owner, and decreases the overall cost of the collision repair process for the vehicle owner and for the collision repair service provider.